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Chaffer's Park was named after Captain EM Chaffers of the New Zealand Company ship Tory, which arrived in 1839.
By late last century the privately owned Te Aro waterfront had become a waste dump and eyesore. In need of extra land, the Harbour Board filled it in, using soil from the hills above Oriental Bay. This 1901-1914 reclamation created the Chaffers site.
For many years the site housed city works, including the rubbish destructor and tram repair yards.
In 1937 public clamour about its ugliness and air pollution led the city council to decide to clear a large section and build a park, "as a fitting approach to the waterfront and Oriental Parade … Every member of the council agreed that the work was long overdue" (The Dominion, November 11, 1937). However the plan was not carried out.
In 1939 the Herd Street Post and Telegraph Building, designed by architect Edmund Anscombe and considered an excellent example of art deco Streamline Moderne, was built on the northern edge. Anscombe also designed a large public garden with a swimming pool for the site. This, too, was not built.